Surb Nshan Armenian Church

18th-century Armenian church in the old town

The Surb Nshan Church is an 18th-century Armenian Apostolic church in the old town, one of several Armenian religious buildings that survive from Tbilisi's long history as a multicultural city. The building has a simple exterior and a well-maintained interior with traditional Armenian ecclesiastical fittings.

Tbilisi's Armenian community, though much reduced from its historic peak, remains active and the church is in regular use. The presence of Armenian churches alongside Georgian Orthodox churches, the Juma Mosque, and the Great Synagogue within a few hundred metres of each other in the old town is one of the most striking expressions of Tbilisi's historic plurality.

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A story
Armenia and Georgia share one of the oldest continuous Christian histories in the world — both converted to Christianity in the 4th century AD, before the Roman Empire. The Armenian community in Tbilisi was for centuries one of the largest and most commercially powerful; at various points in the 18th and 19th centuries, Armenians made up the majority of the city's population. The Surb Nshan church is a physical reminder of that community's former prominence.

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